02 December 2009

suspiciously simple

Older daughter has brought home some recruitment brochures

Day 85/365: We Love Diversity by kugel


I am looking at a typical cover - it is for an international Fortune 500 company and it depicts a 50th floor meeting room with floor-to-ceiling windows affording a panoramic view over a blurry city.

On the table sits a laptop and a single sheet of paper: the laptop is showing a colourful, but suspiciously simple-looking, graph. Standing over it is a tall, good looking, even-toothed African American man (yes, somehow you can tell he his American) who is wearing a tie. He smiles as he points out something to a young, beautiful, smartly dressed, even-toothed, Asian-American girl seated at the table. She is beaming at him

Questions for discussion:
  • is this picture in any way dishonest? if so what justification could you offer for this?
  • should recruitment brochures portray a firm as it is, or as it would like to be?
  • can you name any dimension of human diversity that firms might aspire to, other than employing different coloured Americans?
  • in a typical Fortune 500 firm, which department do you imagine is the least diverse in terms of race and sex
    - sales
    - engineering
    - information technology
    - financial
    - the recruitment department

8 comments:

outside-jane said...

Surely ALL adverts, whatever they are for, show the ideal rather than the reality?

I wonder do American Companies, like American movies, hire British people to be the bad guys?

Botogol said...

think there is a difference advertising your product, from advertising yourself as place to work

M4GD said...

I liked the title of this posting - Interesting choice of words Mr. Botogol. For ease of discussion, you simplified a complex topic that touches upon many facets of life/society/people/businesses. Below are my responses:

Q. is this picture in any way dishonest? if so what justification could you offer for this?
A. It’s not dishonest. What’s dishonest here when we are talking: It’s a ‘Marketing Tool’!
Q. should recruitment brochures portray a firm as it is, or as it would like to be?
A. Recruitment brochures cover both.
Q. can you name any dimension of human diversity that firms might aspire to, other than employing different coloured Americans?
A. You hit the nail on the head. This is where the difficulty lies i.e. defining: ‘the dimension of human diversity’. The majority of the firms are unable to walk the talk. It boils down to a check list. The bottom line is: they are a business. They want to survive and be profitable. They will look at how the law defines ‘diversity’ and its requirements. They will do the basics to meet those requirement. Thus, they are able to say: we are compliant, we belong.
Heaven’s forbid they would take a real practical initiative via a deeper closer look and see if this check list really works on a grass root level?! Or may be they say oh we are bigger than other firms hence we have a higher margin of risk in implementing our business strategy (whatever their definition of risk is) to make a difference and be more diverse than most!!!!
Q. in a typical Fortune 500 firm, which department do you imagine is the least diverse in terms of race and sex
- sales
- engineering
- information technology
- financial
- the recruitment department
A. I’m guessing ‘Sales’!!
Recently, You may have read in the news about the Partner in an American Law Firm who sued his employer over demotion claiming that their core values is just a Marketing Tool: “The suit claims that “core values” adopted by the firm in 2003 or 2004 emphasized teamwork and an atmosphere of mutual respect, but in reality the values were only a marketing tool that had little internal application.”
The above exmaple has nothing to do with ‘diversity’ but the analogy of application is relevant.
In summary, I think ‘diversity’ gets lost in the translation of business tools and sadly ends up being a hollow ‘Marketing Tool’! Is this fair and just? What is fair and just and who should be doing what? And who pays the price for it all? A whole new problem discussion all together, Mr. Botogol, with no concrete answers but in dire need of practical solutions!!!!
Regardless of the bottom line – I personally believe that businesses have moral obligations. However, I qualify this by saying it is not easy to be objective and walk the fine line to balance it all: clients, employees, law, society…so many stakeholders involved with competing diverse interests!
I have never wasted an opportunity to voice the above opinion to those who can make a change with the hope that it serves as a reminder: something is not working and we need to do better.

Beancounter said...

that picture is WAAAAY dishonest. In my professional experience, most beans are brownish green and much more uniform in size.

Botogol said...

@M4gd - I think I am less cynical and more cynical than you
- less cynical: altho firms are businesses, they are also run by individuals and I think many of them (most of them?) truly do want to be fair, and human, and meritocratic about who they recruit. They don't deliberately see diversity in narrow terms...

@beancounter - my favourite bean is the aduki bean.

beancounter said...

:-o Beanist! I can't believe you said that. Out loud. On a public blog.

Botogol said...

I am the Rod Liddle of the bean world

M4GD said...

Cool beans:-)